8/11/2016

With all of the weed we know Seth Rogen has smoked and all of the munchies he's devoured as a result, it stood to reason that an idea as mind-blowingly bizarre and hilarious as Sausage Party would be conjured up out of his fevered brain. It's the kind of foodie filth one dreams up while chomping on Doritos and Twinkies during a psychedelic haze. Let's just say...this ain't no Pixar movie. If you've got kids, take them to see Pete's Dragon or something, unless you want them to forever equate a hot dog bun with a vagina or know what it looks like when a bagel gets banged by a flatbread.

Sausage Party is an animated feature that basically brings back the entire cast of the apocalyptic comedy, This Is the End, another movie that could only have been thought up while higher than Snoop Dogg. So what's it about? Food. Talking food, like the kind in those stupid M&M commercials. If you're like me you might've wondered why people just don't eat those little bastards. That's what they exist for, right? Take that idea, throw in a ton of raunch, food puns galore, culturally insensitive jokes about race and religion, and you've got Sausage Party in a (talking) nutshell.

Rogen voices Frank, a hot dog stuck in a package on a supermarket aisle alongside his sausage brothers (including Michael Cera as the runt sausage, Barry) and his lady love, Brenda (Kristen Wiig), a sexy hot dog bun with lips that look like..well, lips, but not the kind on your face. In-between all of the crass jokes about slipping her the sausage, Frank dreams about The Great Beyond, a place outside the supermarket where all of the foods will meet their nirvana thanks to the Gods, who are just us humans. The edible consumables start each day with a cheery song, composed by the great Alan Menken, in honor of the Gods they hope to go home with. That is until a returned jar of honey mustard (Danny McBride) frantically tries to tell them the truth that the Gods are actually monsters who chop, cook, and eat them. His horrific memories are played out in what can be described as a culinary slasher movie. Nobody believes it, not until he leaps to his death causing a major spill in the supermarket aisle just as Frank and Brenda are about to be purchased. The honey mustard's death scene is a riot, but an insensitive one that will likely offend a good deal of the audience. Hell, those people will find much to be offended about, probably. A burst bag of flour causes a re-enactment straight out of the World Trade Center attack, while also invoking images of war-torn battlefields throughout history: a shattered jar of jelly oozes like blood after an explosive attack, a package of noodles struggles to stuff his insides back in. Sensitive? Not on your life.

Now separated from the pack, Frank and Brenda teamup with a sexy lesbian taco voiced by Salma Hayek (OF COURSE!!), and a squabbling Jewish bagel (Edward Norton, channeling Woody Allen) and Arab flatbread (David Krumholtz, channeling every Arab stereotype ever), to find the mysterious non-perishable Firewater (Bill Hader), who it turns out is a total pothead. Even in a movie like this Rogen manages to work in a trippy drug scene. Actually, there are a couple of them. A latter one involves the use of bath salts, and reveals what happens to all of those discarded foods we humans waste on a regular basis. That old, stale slice of pizza you left sitting out in its nasty cardboard box? That guy has it rough. Remember the pizza, folks, he deserves better.

The jokes fly by at such a rate early on that you're likely to miss some by laughing so hard, and there are so many more in the background for those paying attention. Eventually the one-note sexual humor does grow tiresome, with the worst example being a villainous feminine douche (voiced by an unrecognizable Nick Kroll) who chases Frank and Brenda throughout the store. But there are other moments of brilliance. This is the one movie that can use bread products as an effective allegory for the Arab/Israeli conflict, while also speaking frankly about religion and our reliance on faith. It's clearly a topic Rogen holds dear because he touched upon it in This Is the End, as well. Another point of brilliance is the inclusion of a character that resembles, far more accurately than it should, the great Stephen Hawking. The less said about it the better, experience that one for yourself. Also better left to be discovered for oneself is the finale, an orgasmic display of sexual debauchery that will have you rethinking what an aphrodisiac truly is. Sausage Party will have you rethinking a lot of things, but mostly you'll be left in disbelief that a movie like this has been taken off the shelf and put out into the world where it can change our perception of "dinner and a movie" forever.